Biden Crushes Sanders in Michigan, Missouri ‘Mini-Super Tuesday’ Primaries

WASHINGTON (Sputnik) - Former US Vice President Joe Biden won or was projected to win at least three key primary elections including top prize Michigan, taking what could be an insurmountable delegate lead just past the midway point of the Democratic presidential race.

On Tuesday, six US states held primary elections with more than 350 delegates up for grabs including Michigan (125 delegates), Missouri (36) and Washington (89).

The networks projected Biden to win the states of Missouri and Mississippi as soon as the polls closed in those states at 8:00 p.m. EST (midnight GMT), before official election results were even reported, based on exit poll data and internal forecast models. About an hour later the state of Michigan swung in Biden’s favor.

Biden won the big prize, Michigan, by capturing 53 percent of the vote to Sanders’ 38%, with 72 percent of precincts reporting. The former vice president won nearly 60 percent of the vote in the US state of Missouri over the Vermont senator who only captured 35% of the vote, with nearly all precincts reporting.

He topped Sanders by an even wider margin in Mississippi, where the former vice president had an 80-14 percent lead with votes from 90 percent of precincts counted.

In the second wave of the night, as of late Tuesday, Biden and Sanders were tied at 33% in the state of Washington with 70 percent of precincts reporting.

In North Dakota, Sanders was up by 11 points with almost 40 percent reporting. In Idaho, Biden is leading by 10 points with more than 30 percent of precincts reporting.

Meanwhile, former Democratic presidential candidate Andrew Yang, after the first three states went to Biden, announced that he was endorsing the former Vice President.

Biden also has endorsements from former candidates Senator Amy Klobuchar, former South Bend, Indiana Mayor Pete Buttigieg, former New York City Mayor Mike Bloomberg, former Congressman Beto O'Rourke, among others.

Heading into the contests Biden already had a 91-delegate lead over Sanders (664-573) on the road to capturing the 1,991 needed to secure the nomination.

Last week, on the so-called "Super Tuesday," Biden secured wins in the states of Texas, Massachusetts, Arkansas, Virginia, North Carolina, Tennessee Oklahoma, Minnesota, Alabama and Maine. Sanders won in California, Colorado and Utah.

On 17 March, four major states will hold primary contests including Florida (219 delegates), Illinois (155) and Ohio (136), while 28 April will be the last major test with New York (274) and Pennsylvania (186) in play.

The Democratic Party’s national convention will be held in July in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.

On Tuesday, US President Donald Trump cruised through all six of Tuesday night’s Republican primaries as he has no real challenger to face.